


Tell it All

by hotrodngold (Krystalicekitsu)



Category: Captain America (2011), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Love, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-08
Updated: 2012-01-08
Packaged: 2017-10-29 04:39:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/315919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Krystalicekitsu/pseuds/hotrodngold
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The thing about Tony is, he's not actually as flippant and dismissive as- Okay, no, he <i>is</i> as flippant and dismissive as everyone says he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tell it All

**Author's Note:**

> My very first Steve/Tony. And I actually _like_ it.

The thing about Tony is, he's not actually as flippant and dismissive as-

Okay, no, he _is_ as flippant and dismissive as everyone says he is.

But it's not so much 'flippant and dismissive' as it is he's truly baffled that they haven't already thought about everything up to and including possible snags in plans and desires that happen to be his.

When he tells Pepper 'make it work', he doesn't mean 'I have absolute faith that you will somehow pull a miracle out of your ass'. He actually means 'the way to get the board to cooperate is through Devlin, who always takes his lunch at three and who will cave to just about anything with a seven hundred dollar payment on his tab at Mooney's, and usually is the swing vote on anything involving the aeronautics program, which will give you an easy way to convince the board- if you phrase it right- because _technically_ , the stabilizers I want to use for the new schematic were designed for, and still the purview of, that particular department'.

When he talks over a reporter, as brash and brazen as he can be, he's not actually meaning 'I'm a cock-sure, narcissistic asshole who thinks only myself is good enough material for _anything_ fit-to-print', but more 'I know that if I talk fast enough and smile confidently enough, you'll be more interested in asking me to bed, than asking what I think about my father or- worse- what my father would think of me'.

Tony's confident and sure and- okay, he comes across as flippant and dismissive and occasionally as a narcissistic asshole, but more frustrating than people not being able to think that fast, and plan that far is that everyone takes so much of him at face value that _he starts doing it too_ , so much so that when he runs into Steve late one night, battling insomnia and memories of being hooked up to a much less efficient life-saving battery and being forced to sell himself and his ideals- even if only as a charade- he doesn't pay his off-hand comment any real thought.

It's flippant and dismissive, has the right tone to be perfectly 100% narcissistic asshole, and would have gotten anyone's dander up-

But Cap doesn't snarl at him.

He doesn't snarl or snark or sneer. Just crowds Tony back, like he can make Tony do any damn thing he wants with nothing more than a look and says,

"No one in the world has to hurt alone."

And then he steps back, light blue Aryan eyes staring down into his own and Tony thinks- for once in his life, he doesn't know what he's thinking, but then Cap leans forward again, subtly like grain swaying in the smallest breeze-

"Not even you, Tony."

And he's walking slowly away and Tony tries not to fall down from the weakness in his knees, tries not to let his gasping breath put him on his ass and tries ever so very hard not to think exactly what was in those too-young-too-old eyes that could bring him this close to tears.


End file.
